


i get eaten by the worms and weird fishes

by ilaeth



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Best Friends, Camping, Canon Compliant, Childhood Friends, Fluff and Humor, Implied Relationships, M/M, Mutual Pining, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Relationships, Sharing a Bed, Summer Vacation, Touching, Underage Drinking, iwaoi - Freeform, seijoh 3rd years - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:55:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23884849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilaeth/pseuds/ilaeth
Summary: Oikawa’s sunburn has developed from raspberry pink to lobster-red. He’s sitting like his body’s too big for the tight confines of his skin, face crumpled and back stiff. Underneath the harsh redness Iwaizumi can spot freckles splattering Oikawa’s shoulders and neck, peppering a necklace across his collarbones. His face is in better shape: less sunburn; a bridge of freckles across the slope of his nose. He has sunglasses in his hairline and his hair is curling in the wrong directions to usual from where sweat had worn hair gel away. Without makeup his eyelashes glow a pale brown, casting the fainest shadows across his cheeks.Iwaizumi has to avert his gaze to the can in his hand. He pulls the tab bag, letting the air hiss out, before taking a swig.// seijoh third years go camping. shenanigans ensue.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 6
Kudos: 120





	i get eaten by the worms and weird fishes

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from the song weird fishes by radiohead! 
> 
> beta'd by my lovely friend norah.

“Take this in, lovebirds,” Hanamaki drawls, hooking his lithe arms over both Oikawa and Iwaizumi’s shoulders as they stand in awe of the sight that is Lake Katanuma. “Drink up the sight like a dying man. This is our last day to be free.”

“Lovebirds?”

“Hands  _ off,  _ Makki!”

Oikawa arches his back and squeals at the pressure against his shoulders. He jumps away from them both, shooting a horrified glare back to Hanamaki who mirrors it with one of delight. Where they’d been walking in the sun for the better part of Friday Oikawa, determined to ‘allow his superior genes to shine through’, has burnt. In gentle sunshine he is sunkissed and freckled. Today he’s hot-pink with skin shining strongly enough to reflect light back where it came from. 

“I think you’re being pretty dramatic, there,” Matsukawa chimes in. He hikes Oikawa’s Ted Baker backpack higher over his shoulder because Iwaizumi had refused to carry it and Oikawa had thrown a tantrum. “It’s your fault we came the hillbilly way.”

“You and your sketchy mountain tracks you’ve printed off of Pinterest.” Iwaizumi, in stark comparison to Oikawa, is tanned golden and considerably less agitated. He shields his eyes and looks out to the lake, green with algae and speckled with dragonflies. “Why can’t you be normal for once?”

“I’m not ordinary. I’m  _ extra _ ordinary,” Oikawa remarks through gritted teeth, struggling very hard to maneuver his sunglasses into his hairline without scraping at the tender skin there and straining his shoulders. 

Iwaizumi does it for him, stepping over and adjusting the sunglasses until they hold his sweaty curls from his forehead. “Aloe’s in my bag,” he tells him, fingers lingering a beat too long as he tucks the arms of the sunglasses behind Oikawa’s ears, parting to stand next to Matsukawa. “Put it on yourself while we set up the camp.”

“‘Camp’.” Matsukawa huffs a laugh beneath his breath. “You say that like our tents aren’t my dad’s from the 70s and Oikawa’s sister’s  _ Bratz _ one.”

“Sick burn,” Hanamaki grins, leaning his elbow against Matsukawa’s shoulder. “Oh, shit. Am I not allowed to say that around Oikawa?”   
  
“Stop it, guys,” Iwaizumi chides. “He’ll start crying.”

“This isn’t fun.” He’s pouting now, looking at the three of them wholly unimpressed with his arms crossed over his chest through great effort. The bridge of his nose is wrinkled and his bottom lip sticks out, petulance shining through at being on the receiving end of the teasing for once. Iwaizumi thinks that, despite his godawful personality and enormous ego, Oikawa can look cute. Sometimes. 

With a groan Matsukawa drops to the floor, the bags on both of his shoulders hitting the gravel and batting up red dust to the air around them. “Can’t we just do it here?” He gestures to the area around them: a one meter incline from the rim of the lake. Iwaizumi poses with his hands on his hips, considering it, before deciding he’s too tired to lug around Oikawa any further. He nods. 

“Won’t be too kind on our backs.” Hanamaki slings his bag down, too.

In the humidity of the summer air his waterline eyeliner has run, smudging beneath his lashes, leaving him looking like a raccoon. He crosses his legs and leans back onto his hands, looking up to the cloudless sky with a squint.

“ _ Your _ back,” Iwaizumi corrects, sitting down in the asphalt to ease off pressure from his heels. He’s got a few bites on his legs and they’re itching like hell. “Seeing as you forgot to bring your sleeping bag.”

“Let me share with you. Let me get all up in that ace goodness.”

“No way. You snore.”

“Do not.  _ Oikawa  _ does.”

“I do  _ not _ .” With trouble he crouches down next to Iwaizumi’s bag to rifle through for the aloe. When he finds it he produces it to Iwaizumi, who rolls his eyes, pats the floor next to him, and massages it into Oikawa’s hot arms. “At least I don’t piss my bed.”

“Woah,” Matsukawa looks up from where he’d been wrestling to tug a can of beer from the plastic rings holding them together. “He went there.”

“He  _ did _ . You little feisty thing, you.”

Unpacking comes with its challenges. Oikawa sheds a tear when he sees a thorn has dug a small scrape into the leather of his bag. Hanamaki carefully hangs his speaker on a nearby dry bush as both Iwaizumi and Matsukawa wrestle the tents into the unforgiving asphalt beneath them. They’ve set up the largest one by the time the sun begins to set. 

“I didn’t consider,” Oikawa begins, cracking open the can, “how small my tent would be.”

“It’s a fucking  _ kids _ tent!” With wild gestures Iwaizumi tosses his hands to the pathetic sight in front of him. “ _ Why _ did you even bring this along?”

“I didn’t test it beforehand, okay?! I was under the  _ impression _ one of you would!”

“I  _ thought _ it felt a little light…” Hanamaki remarks. 

“It’s not our responsibility to check that what you bring isn’t--” Iwaizumi draws in a sharp breath up his nose before exhaling, holding his hands palm-down, and closing his eyes. “I’m removing myself from the situation.”

“Oh, Hajime, how responsible.”

“We’ll all have to share.” Matsukawa says it offhandedly, midway to unpacking his own tent pegs from his bag. At the silence he looks up, raising a brow. “No one’s opposed, right? Tough shit. It was probably going to end up like this, anyway.”

The larger tent sits folded on the ground. Oikawa looks at it, mouth twisting into a frown. “That’s going to be a tight squeeze.”

“It’ll be fine. None of us will sleep much, anyway, given how hot it is.”

“I’m going to the lake,” Iwaizumi announces. He crosses one bicep over his chest to stretch out his joints. With a tug his shoulder clicks. “Gonna see if we can swim in it.”

He parts without a second thought, walking down the bank to the rim of the water. It’s still where it sits, green under the afternoon sun, dazzling with each ripple the water’s surface makes. Iwaizumi walks over to the dock and slips his shoes off to sit down on the rotting wood, dipping his feet in to his ankles. It’s murky but cool against the bites he’s gotten all day; temporary relief. 

With a sigh he leans back onto his hands and closes his eyes. Hanamaki’s right. This is their last day they get to be free; before Oikawa returns to his adoring fans and Iwaizumi home, to his mother who’s trying to set him up with her friend’s-aunt’s-sister’s-daughter, because you like brunettes don’t you, Hajime? Because he  _ does _ like brunettes, but not like that. Never like that.

He thinks of the larger freckles on Oikawa’s shoulders, and the exact shade of pink his lips are. How, when it comes to choosing universities, they’ll probably part and go their separate ways. Oikawa wants to travel and go pro. Iwaizumi wants to go to veterinary school. They can’t stick together like they always have been, with Oikawa being just a fence away, even if that’s what Iwaizumi desperately wants. He and Oikawa aren’t dating. Oikawa isn’t even gay. He tells himself to be realistic.

The cold press of tin at the back of his neck draws him from his stupor as he looks up to Oikawa, sunburnt and sweaty, holding out a can of beer for him. 

“Thanks,” he murmurs, letting Oikawa use him as leverage to maneuver his way to sit. He winces when he settles, hand lingering over the sun-warmed skin of Iwaizumi’s shoulder before dropping to rest between them. 

Oikawa’s sunburn has developed from raspberry pink to lobster-red. He’s sitting like his body’s too big for the tight confines of his skin, face crumpled and back stiff. Underneath the harsh redness Iwaizumi can spot freckles splattering Oikawa’s shoulders and neck, peppering a necklace across his collarbones. His face is in better shape: less sunburn; a bridge of freckles across the slope of his nose. He has sunglasses in his hairline and his hair is curling in the wrong directions to usual from where sweat had worn hair gel away. Without makeup his eyelashes glow a pale brown, casting the fainest shadows across his cheeks.

Iwaizumi has to avert his gaze to the can in his hand. He pulls the tab bag, letting the air hiss out, before taking a swig.

Oikawa has cider instead of beer. There’s a peach-coloured straw hanging out of the can, chewed at the top, barely brushing his bottom lip. He seems to hold the same sentiment as Iwaizumi; quietly admiring the sight in front of them both as the sun sets around the canyon.

There’s no need to fill the silence between them. It’s always been comfortable and they’re used to each other’s presence more than they aren’t. Sometimes, Iwaizumi will catch himself turning to the empty space on his bed to pose a question to Oikawa but realises that he’s either out on another date or he’s studying. Years of afternoons sitting in front of his room’s TV has developed muscle memory, he thinks. But Iwaizumi speaks anyway. “Where are Hanamaki and Matsukawa?”

“Bratz tent blew down the banking,” Oikawa says, tilting his head so he can watch Iwaizumi out of the corner of his eye. Flyaway curls escape the sunglasses holding the majority of his hair back. They flutter in the breeze. “They’ve gone to get it before it gets pulled to shreds by the spiky plants.”

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes. “Let it die there.”

“That’s illegal, Iwa-chan, you litterbug. We may be underage and drinking, which is at the very least socially acceptable, but being known as a hooligan who litters is something I do  _ not _ stand for.”

“That Bratz tent surpasses laws. If the police show up, find it, do you think they’d salvage it? The cacti will reject it. Even nature has better taste than you.”

“Grumpy Iwa-chan,” Oikawa remarks. He sits his can of cider in the space between his thighs, shifting forward a little so his feet brush the water. “If you frown any more than you’ll sprout a few grey patches! Maybe paired with your wrinkles you’ll pass as old enough to get into bars without an I.D.”

Oikawa is taller than him now by just a few centimeters. Compared to middle school his face and body has lost the softness it once had, puberty sculpting definition into his muscles and features. The line of his legs is longer than it used to be and his jump serves are powerful enough to tear someone’s hands from their wrists, but when he smiles a genuine smile the dimple in his left cheek still appears. His hair still has that boyish curl to it, and he still cries when watching E.T.. Iwaizumi thinks that past the radical change from the best friend he used to catch butterflies with to the best friend he helps prepare for a hopeful National’s with, he’s still the same old Oikawa.

Iwaizumi wonders why he doesn’t feel jealous. He thinks he should be, with what attention Oikawa garners from upper and underclassmen and even women older than his sister. He’s the best setter Iwaizumi’s ever seen. He’s intelligent; a model student, and he’s handsome enough to  _ actually _ model, Iwaizumi reckons, even if he  _ does  _ have the personality of a wet paper towel. 

“Not grumpy,” Iwaizumi corrects, “just tired.”

“Sleepy Iwa-chan.”   


“If you hadn’t made me carry you up those steps on my back I don’t think I’d be as exhausted.” A pause. “Drop the  _ -chan _ for once.”

“You should be thankful, Iwa-chan. This is the only time you’ll receive a doting pet name.”

“Shitty Oikawa, I don’t want one.” Iwaizumi says. “Crappy Oikawa.”

“Don’t deflect your pent-up frustrations on me, Iwa-chan! I’m only here to help you. Your friendly neighborhood Oikawa doesn’t want you to die cold and alone.”

When Iwaizumi looks over there’s something playful and warm in Oikawa’s gaze. He finds it momentarily hard to breathe, carefully averting his gaze back out to Lake Katanuma, which pales in comparison to the sight right next to him, and hopes what he’s feeling inside doesn’t translate to his face. “I don’t think advice coming from someone who made a first year cry when you straight-up forgot to turn up to your date with her is the most valuable thing in the world.”   


“Stingy Iwa-chan.”

“ _ Trashy _ Oikawa.”

“Not trashy;  _ never _ trashy.” Oikawa says pointedly. He amends: “Classy.”

“ _ You _ are possibly  _ the _ least classy person on planet Earth. You use the same razor to shave your legs that you do your face.” Iwaizumi plucks the straw from Oikawa’s can to slot it into his own, taking a sip. “At least the general public doesn't know about your short-lived career in child acting.”

He huffs. Oikawa raises up to snatch the plastic straw from Iwaizumi’s mouth to put back into his cider and take a sip from. “At least the general public doesn't know that you were bald until aged five.”

If you share a straw, it used to mean you kissed, once upon a time. Was that how it worked? Because Iwaizumi had only kissed a girl, once; a neighbor of Oikawa’s and his. She lived four houses down and was a school year older than them. It was lackluster and left Iwaizumi feeling horrifyingly lost, but even this: the soft plush of Oikawa’s lips pursing around the straw he’d just drunk from already leaves him feeling warmer inside than whatever kiss he’d shared when he was younger.

There’s a sound like someone’s speaking to him underwater. It isn’t until Iwaizumi feels a touch to his bicep that he resurfaces from the depths and realises Oikawa has been calling his name for the past minute, looking thoroughly unimpressed. “Sorry.”

“Something on your mind?”

Oikawa reaches out in genuine concern, the gentlest brush of fingers to his thigh, asking about needing some paracetamol, Iwa-chan?, or something. Iwaizumi can’t hear him behind the sound of the hive of bees behind his ribcage. And it shouldn’t matter much as it does because Oikawa has a girlfriend, probably, because he always has a girlfriend even when they never last and Iwaizumi likes to think he might know why. It shouldn’t matter but it  _ does _ . 

“Everything’s fine.” Iwaizumi fixes the crooked sunglasses tangled in Oikawa’s loose curls. His hands linger before he pushes himself to stand and helps Oikawa up, too, past the stiffness of his sunburn. “I told you you should’ve put suncream on.”

Oikawa winces when he stands, using Iwaizumi as leverage again to steady himself, working elasticity back into his skin. “Yes, well, I thought maybe once my genetics wouldn’t fail me like they haven’t in all my other areas.”

“You can’t fight the sun.” Iwaizumi points out.

“Don’t listen to him, Oikawa.” Hanamaki emerges from the shrubbery to their left, tent bulging in his cradle, possibly now even more burnt than Oikawa. His hair is hot pink from a poor dye job and stood against the backdrop of the sunset he practically blends in. “Science is no match for the modern day man.”

Matsukawa looks a little less worse for wear, picking out and flicking away what looks like a cactus needle from his forearm. He follows closely behind, carrying the tent’s pegs. “What’re you going to do, punch it?”

“I’ll just attack at night. It will never suspect a thing.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“I’m losing brain cells the longer I spend around you two,” Oikawa groans, rolling his eyes as he pulls the sunglasses back down to rest on his nose. The amber of the sunset reflects on his hair, colouring it auburn and rusty.

Hanamaki beams, hiking the tent higher in his arms. Iwaizumi thinks he might see a rip in the fabric with how sunlight is filtering through it. “I thought you said it was the Bratz tent that went flying?”

“Both did.” Hanamaki holds the grey one up. “Nature doesn’t discriminate, unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately.”

They all trek up the small distance to the top of the rise of the hill and cast a final glance out to the lake. It’s as if the world stops for one small moment; that the birds merely hover and the wind calms. As the sun sets Lake Katanuma is a mirror of brilliant gold, a pool of honey reflecting warmth to their faces. Matsukawa whistles low at the sight. Next to Iwaizumi, Oikawa brushes their hands together. His heart swells behind his ribs.

* * *

At camp Iwaizumi is wrestling Hanamaki for the final tent peg like he’s a cat who has plastic in its mouth and Matsukawa is rolling up something in paper on the warm surface of a large rock. Oikawa curses at the fire that refuses to catch, assaulting it with a bramble.

“Why won’t it stay up?” He stabs the peg further into the ground but the wires seem to droop. One wall of the tent caves in on itself.

Hanamaki looks in just as much frustration. He’s holding it up while Iwaizumi secures the final corner. “I don’t know, but you’d best hurry up. My arms are killing me.”

“I’m going as fast as I can!”

“Well, it’s not very fast.”

“You two,” Oikawa calls. They turn to pin him with frustrated stares. He nudges the branch at the drooping wall of the tent. “Take a look at it. It’s ripped.”

Hanamaki and Iwaizumi share a look. He takes a step back from trying to kick the peg into the ground and frowns. Oikawa’s right.

“This looks so sad,” Oikawa comments, crouching down next to the rip. The material is torn from the top corner to halfway down the wall. He attempts to hold both ends of the fabric together uselessly, like thin air will fix it. 

“We’ll just have to use this as the door and close up the zip on the  _ actual _ opening,” Matsukawa says, pushing himself to stand. Iwaizumi sighs at the sight. Given up, Hanamaki sits on a rock to their left next to the fire, massaging aloe vera into his legs. “Your sister gonna be mad about the broken Bratz one?”

Oikawa shrugs. He zips up the opening to the tent and stands back next to Matsukawa and Iwaizumi, hands posed on his hips. “Iwa-chan was right. It deserved to go.”

“Great.”

“This doesn’t solve how we’re going to sleep with three walls surrounding us.” 

The tent sags miserably where the tear runs along one of the sides, rendering it lopsided. Oikawa claps his hands together. “A romantic night under the stars, then!”

“For who?” Matsukawa asks.

“All of us, of course.”   


“Oikawa enjoys polygamy.”

“I do  _ not _ .”

“Enjoy getting malaria from the mosquitoes.” Iwaizumi moves to help Matsukawa, who’s trying to tie the loose fabric of the tent together in a knot. Oikawa surveys from the sidelines, expression dropping. The fabric pulls too taught and rips from the wire outline. Matsukawa sighs through his nose. Oikawa begins to cry.

“Oh, well done.” Hanamaki says.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you,” Iwaizumi stands to his full feight and points an accusatory finger at a very shiny Oikawa, “had checked the other tent before leaving. How are four of us meant to sleep in a broken two-person tent?”

“A night under the stars,” he repeats, gesturing to the setting sun. “Romance!”

Their campsite is pathetic. They’d been planning it for weeks, with the promise of Oikawa’s sister getting them all alcohol and the area’s trail written clearly on the map it was determined to be a good night. It didn’t help that for the first hour they’d been heading South instead of North and that the barbeque Iwaizumi had bought had gotten damp. The tin box sits face-up a few meters from the tent. 

“Can we pour alcohol or something on this fire to get it started?” Hanamaki asks, nudging it with the toe of his Croc. “It’s barely burning bright enough to keep my toes warm.”

“No,” Matsukawa, Iwaizumi, and Oikawa say in unison.

For safety reasons Iwaizumi plucks the bottle of whiskey from Hanamaki’s hands. He’s been drinking it for the past ten minutes on an empty stomach. “Oikawa, did your sister give you this?”

“No?” He looks up from where he’s trying to fix the opening of the tent. “That isn’t mine.”

“How the hell do you even get your hands on stuff like this?”

“Mom’s nice alcohol cupboard,” Matsukawa elaborates. He moves to sit next to Hanamaki by the fire with his knee crooked up, elbow and chin resting on it, staring into the smoldering coals of their fire. “She’s gonna kill me when she realises it’s gone. I think it’s, like, a collectable’s edition.”

“Just fill it with apple juice,” Hanamaki says, “It looks the same.”

“Let’s hope she doesn’t try to crack it open in the next few years.”

Iwaizumi peers down to the bottle in his hand. He frowns. 

“Anyone got a lighter here?” he asks, capping the bottle with his thumb other than a small opening. He tosses a few splashes over the damp coals, takes the lighter from Matsukawa, and sets a small branch aflame. He drops it into the fire and it lights up like a Christmas tree.

“Handyman Iwa-chan,” Oikawa remarks. He’s given up on the tent and has shifted to the fire along with the other three. “Can I have the bottle?”

He passes it over, knowing sooner or later that Oikawa would get his hands on it, and squats down to the opened barbecue. With the branch of a dry bush he nudges the coals. “Not too bad.”   


“Nice and toasty.”

* * *

Oikawa shifts further up Iwaizumi’s lap, tilting his face towards the fire so it warms him. He’s always been a terrible drunk and tonight doesn’t prove any different with how he floored himself after just a few swigs. Iwaizumi sighs and gently cards his fingers through Oikawa’s fringe to draw his hair from his face, shifting to better accommodate the head in his lap.

Iwaizumi might not admit it but he’s a little drunk, too. They all are. Hanamaki’s tipped over his backpack, skewering marshmallows onto a stick, and Matsukawa is inspecting something that looks very interesting on the whiskey’s label. The marshmallows bubble and caramelise against the flames. Oikawa makes grabby hands, to which Hanamaki holds out the stick for him and lets him take a marshmallow that has mostly burnt, popping it into his mouth. He pats Iwaizumi’s thigh before settling back down onto it.

“You guys decided what unis you’ve been looking at, yet?”

A groan. “God, no. None of that. Please none of that talk.”

“Hey,” Matsukawa holds his hands up in defence, “I was just looking for conversation. It’s a pretty big deal.”

Iwaizumi hums his answer, brow knitting. Across the fire Matsukawa’s eyes flicker behind the flames. He and Oikawa look to be the only ones who have their shit together. Iwaizumi’s failing chemistry and Hanamaki has mentioned before that his parents can’t afford university. His fingers pick back up in Oikawa’s hair, something to distract himself with. “I know. Sorry.”

Hanamaki waves him off. “It’s stressful for all of us. Even you, Mattsun. Don’t think I haven’t seen you balding with all that stress your old man is giving you.”

He tips back against the rock, sun-warmed and smooth, huffing a laugh beneath his breath. “Is it that obvious?”

“What, that little nugget of skin on the crown of your scalp? Or the fact that you’re stressed?”

Oikawa shifts against Iwaizumi’s thigh. When he speaks it’s muffled with drowsiness and his squished cheek. “I think ‘nugget’ is an understatement.”

“Says you. You’re sprouting grays.”

“False.” Oikawa cracks an eye open. He reaches out for an uncooked marshmallow from the packet and pops it into his mouth. “I’m youthful and I dye my hair.”

“His mom does it for him.”

Oikawa slaps Iwaizumi’s knee, frowning, eyes fluttering closed. He looks ready to catnap again. When he speaks it’s muffled by the marshmallow in his cheek. “Stop it, Iwa-chan.”

“‘ _ Exposing Oikawa Tooru. _ You know, when I get famous as a celebrity journalist in the near future you’ll be the first person I go to for dirt, Iwaizumi,” Hanamaki says. He grins, skewering another marshmallow onto the stick. “Here’s to growing up, and our last summer vacation as Seijoh.”

The bottle ends up being nearly finished within the hour, lying propped up next to the tent, corked and forgotten. Matsukawa passes a cigarette between the three of them. Oikawa sleeps through it, a thin trail of drool seeping through Iwaizumi’s shorts from Oikawa’s mouth. The fire crackles and hisses as dusk washes over their lonely campsite, sky bruising purple and navy and lavender.. “For all the shit he does,” Matsukawa murmurs, smoke curling out of his mouth when he speaks, “Oikawa sure does have his moments. I mean, look at this place. Looks like a fuckin’ Disney film set, or something.”

“Don’t let him hear you. His head’s big enough as it is,” Iwaizumi says, fingers still carding through Oikawa’s hair, despite knowing he’s asleep.

Hanamaki rolls from his back onto his stomach, chin propped in his hands. He regards both Oikawa and Iwaizumi with a knowing look that Iwaizumi isn’t sure he likes before pushing to sit, head lolling onto Matsukawa’s shoulder. “We can come back here, now we know the way.”

“Maybe. So long as Iwaizumi doesn’t get us lost.”

“That wasn’t me,” he counters. “You’re the one who needed to pee four times during the walk so we kept moving off track. I’ve no fucking idea where Oikawa got those directions from. Makes me think this area is off-limits to the public, or something.”

“Imagine,” Hanamaki murmurs with a snort. He plucks the cigarette from Matsukawa’s lips and takes a drag. His figure distorts and flutters behind the heat of the fire separating them. Iwaizumi looks down to Oikawa and gently removes the sunglasses from his hairline so they don’t dig into his scalp when he sleeps.

The cricket of cicadas fill the silence. The fire dies out.

They migrate back to the tent when it gets too cold. It’s hardly big enough to fit them all in, let alone comfortably, and due to the heat of summer and the sauna that was the tent itself they keep both the broken side and the zipper of the tent open. Sleeping bags prove useless. Every few minutes Oikawa rolls over, twitching with the pain of prickly heat, and one of them is snoring loud enough to rattle the birds from their trees.

Through the haze of sleep Iwaizumi feels a nudge at his shoulder. He grunts, ignores it, and nestles deeper into the warmth of Oikawa’s back.

It happens for a second time. He sits up and scowls, hissing in the silence of the tent with squinted eyes. “What? What the _ fuck _ do you want?”

Hanamaki’s hair is sticking up in seven different directions. His eyes are wider than saucers, eyeliner smeared unevenly on his cheekbones, and he has a finger held up to his lips in a  _ shh _ gesture. Iwaizumi rubs his eye to try and clear some sleep and calm himself down so as to not throttle Hanamaki to death. Carefully, as to not wake up the other two, Hanamaki peels back the tear in the tent. 

There’s a car parked on the edge of the forest surrounding the lake. The headlamps are on, and in the light’s projection stands what looks to be a park ranger and two dogs at his heel.

“Fucking shit.” Iwaizumi whispers.

“What do we do?”

Iwaizumi’s impressed he manages to keep his voice level enough to hiss: “How the fuck am I meant to know? Why is there a policeman? Are we trespassing on private property, or something?”

A pause.

“Oh God, Iwaizumi. You jinxed it. You jinxed it earlier.”

Iwaizumi groans and pushes to sit up properly. Oikawa twitches next to him but otherwise doesn’t wake up. Hanamaki anxiously bites the skin around his nails. Iwaizumi pats around on the ground of the tent for his phone and jacket as the sour bite of alcohol protests inside his gut, curling and tightening in a knot.

With his phone found he turns on the screen to check the time. “It’s half one. Why the fuck are there police patrolling?” A flashlight shines around their area and manages to slip through the tear. At the shock of it Matsukawa shoots upright, slamming his head into the rock above.

“What? What is it?” Matsukawa groans, hand clasped over the spot on his head he’d hit.

“There’s a policeman and two dogs, like, two hundred meters away.”

_ “What?”  _   
  


“Did I stutter?” Iwaizumi growls. He runs his hand through the short hairs at his hairline, desperately trying to wake up. The earth beneath him tilts on his axis because he’s hardly had enough time to sober up in the last hour, and what little sleep he had gotten was interrupted by the heat of the night.

At the commotion Oikawa shifts on the material of his sleeping bag, rolling over to face the group. He squints in the darkness and takes in the three sets of eyes scrutinising him with varying levels of anger. He pushes himself up to sit, sleep-rumpled and grumpy at being woken. “Why are we all shouting?” 

_ “Come out, put your hands where I can see them! You’re trespassing on private property!” _

“Oh, for fucks sake.” Hanamaki groans, rubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes. 

“You brought us onto  _ private property _ and didn’t think to tell us?” Iwaizumi growls. He can feel a vein popping in his forehead. Oikawa has his fingers over his mouth, hair sticking up completely sideways, humming in thought as he decides on whether or not to confront the issue or not.

There’s a moment of silence before Matsukawa says, very calmly: “Maybe this isn’t the best time to mention that I also have weed in my bag.”

“Great. Fucking  _ great _ , you selfish bastard.”

Iwaizumi rises up as high as the tent will allow him. He pokes his head through the slit in the side and winces when the beam of the torch hits him square-on. He returns back to the safety of the tent, tone grave: “We’re all going to jail. We aren’t even going to Nationals, but we’re going to  _ prison. _ Great, guys. Thanks a lot.”

“ _ Us?  _ It’s  _ you _ who brought the barbeque and made a smoke signal!”   
  
“I didn’t bring  _ alcohol _ to drink with a bunch of underage teens!”

“Yes, well  _ I’m _ not the one possessing  _ illegal substances! _ ”

There’s a moment of nothing; no moving, no speaking, no breathing, before the four of them erupt into a flurry of movement. Iwaizumi kicks his shoes on. Oikawa pulls his cardigan on over his shoulders, bare chested and bleary, quickly making do of his laces on his shoes. In a mad rush all four of them tumble out of the tent’s slit. From across the campsite, maybe a hundred meters away, the flashlight shines in their direction. 

“Guys,” From their left Hanamaki picks up the lonely bottle of whiskey, eyes wild, “someone pass me a lighter.”

“Don’t you  _ dare! _ ”

Hanamaki uncorks the bottle of whiskey and throws it against the rock closest to the tent. Oikawa’s head moves rapidly between the situation at hand at the rapidly approaching policeman, and Matsukawa desperately tries to snag his bag from the tent. Fumbling in his pocket Iwaizumi uncaps the zippo lighter from earlier and tosses it into the puddle. 

The tent bursts into flames. With a whoop Matsukawa staggers back, barely escaping the heat. Iwaizumi stands in awe of the sight that he hardly notices Oikawa grab onto his hand and tug him forward. He feels him thread their fingers before he’s taking off in a sprint in the direction of the woodlands, just ten or twenty meters away and he’s running for his life, wind whipping the hair from his face, feet pounding against asphalt. His chest is aching and his legs are burning but the pure adrenaline running through his veins makes every sensation other than the warmth in his palm blur out.

They crash through the shrubbery, making a mad dash over and under thick tree branches and roots. Iwaizumi tosses a look over his shoulder to see one of the dogs being let off the lead and propells both himself and Oikawa quicker forward. 

They run and they run until there’s nowhere to go any further. They round the corner and nearly take a tumble down a steep banking. Iwaizumi tugs Oikawa back to his feet just in time, stumbling back, watching the earth before them crumble and topple down the drop in loose chunks. They tread backwards, heaving, looking over the sharp drop. Iwaizumi turns to Oikawa; Oikawa turns to Iwaizumi.

Oikawa leans forward and clutches onto his bicep as they burst into raucous laughter, heaving for air. Iwaizumi can hardly contain himself through his howls, knees weak with it, tears streaming down his jaw. He’s half-drunk and delirious but nothing but warmth runs through his blood and he thinks he’s a little in love right now, with the hand on his arm and the grin on Oikawa’s face.

“Why did you take us to a private camping ground?!”

“I didn’t realise it was  _ serious! _ It’s how most places say they’re private but no one does anything when you go on them.” Oikawa argues, wiping his eye with the wool of his cardigan. “Gosh, gosh. Sorry.”

Iwaizumi heaves, trying to catch his breath from the laughter and the sprinting. Oikawa’s teeth and eyes gleam in the darkness, barely illuminated by the moon’s light. He tightens his fingers around Iwaizumi’s arm. They look around one another to the indistinguishable shrubbery. “I have no idea where we are.”

“It’s fine.” Iwaizumi takes a step back from the drop in front of them and leads them on to more even ground. Instead of dry asphalt the earth here has some give to it, and as they descend further into the woods, the trees grow thicker. Oikawa clings to his side, arm hooked around Iwaizumi’s. “Come on, I distinctly remember seeing a main road on the way up here.”

“That’s bound to be miles away.” Oikawa murmurs. He reaches into the pocket of his cardigan and pulls out his phone which shows no signal. It’s gone two in the morning. He sighs and puts it back.

The journey takes them in a straight line further down the area they initially came from. What little light the moon gives shines down through the branches and lands on mossy tree roots and soft mounds of mole hills. Oikawa jolts every time he hears a stick crunch, sunburn eased by the morning’s chill. “Say,” he says after a moment of silence, “where do you think Mattsun and Makki are?”

“God,” Iwaizumi groans, “I seriously do  _ not _ want to know.”

“I didn’t see them follow us...maybe they’re in danger?”

“They’re smart enough. They’ll figure  _ something _ out.”

Oikawa doesn’t speak for a while after that. Iwaizumi can hear him thinking past the rustle of the trees and the snaps of branches beneath their feet. The trail draws to a brook. Iwaizumi lets Oikawa cling onto him in a piggyback as he takes them across the water before putting him down gently on the other side. Oikawa reaches back down for his hand. Iwaizumi lets him because facing his fears doesn’t seem so scary when he’s not alone.

Oikawa breaks the silence with a panicked: “What if the police have them, Iwa-chan?”   


“They’ll be fine. Those two are cockroaches.” He squeezes his hand. “They’ll survive a nuclear war before getting into trouble.”

Oikawa makes an unhappy sound at that; a small whine under his breath, but doesn’t protest further. Iwaizumi is just as on-edge as he is about the whole fiasco. He doesn’t even want to  _ think  _ about the repercussions he’ll get from his mother, let alone the law for setting a fire in an off-limits area.

At long last they hear traffic. Oikawa hangs onto Iwaizumi’s arm as they wait on the side of the road, praying for a kind person without a criminal background to pass them by. A woman in a pickup truck in her mid forties slows down for both of them after a short while of waiting. She rolls down the window and sticks her elbow out the window frame. “Need a ride?”

“Please.”

“Where to?”

“Anywhere close to a bus stop."

Both of them stay huddled in the backseat. Conversation is light because Iwaizumi doesn’t want to reveal just why he’s drunk and Oikawa is shirtless on the side of the road. Oikawa takes to sitting in the middle seat, fingers clinging tight around Iwaizumi’s. He smooths his thumb across Oikawa’s to try and ease the obvious tension in his shoulders. He thinks it might do something because his figure gives an inch or so and his head tips to Iwaizumi’s shoulder.

He meets the gaze of the woman’s in the rear view mirror and she smiles at them. It’s the same look Hanamaki had given him. It’s the same look he gets from Oikawa’s sister; that awful  _ knowing _ look, like they understand precisely what’s going on even if Iwaizumi only knows half the story. Oikawa nestles up closer, breath ghosting against Iwaizumi’s collarbone. He averts his gaze to the window instead, and she turns on the radio to a quiet pop station.

After parting a few miles from their pickup point Oikawa’s phone buzzes in his pocket, finally connecting to a cellphone tower. He scrolls through a few messages, sends a few, before repocketing his phone. Even then he resettles his head against Iwaizumi’s shoulder.

He doesn’t want to look into it. Oikawa and him have always been like this. Like  _ that _ , he thinks; close in a way couples might be but it’s not awkward. It’s never awkward if it’s them. His fingers give Oikawa’s a little squeeze, and the pressure is returned.

They reach a small village on the outskirts of town not before long. The lady kindly drops them off and wishes them luck for the rest of their school year, pulling off to continue her journey. It’s still dark above and it’s cold, so they huddle at the bus station together in relative silence until an hour passes and they hop on the next bus.

“What are you gonna say to your sister?” Iwaizumi asks. They’re the only ones on, save for a man sitting towards the front. His voice feels loud even past the rumble of the engine and the buzz of the poor fluorescents. 

Oikawa shrugs. “She didn’t care about that tent anyway. It was a good evening otherwise, right?”

“What, past the tent catching on fire and us evading the police?” Iwaizumi laughs. Oikawa joins in, smiling that soft smile of his that does things to Iwaizumi’s gut a rollercoaster never could. “Sure, it was pretty good.”

* * *

Their first day as third years doesn’t feel any different to the other two years they’ve met for the beginning of school’s term. Iwaizumi knocks Oikawa’s door and waits. He’s made an effort this year, or at the very least today, to tuck his shirt in. He’s even wearing his tie.

Oikawa, perfectly coiffed and looking every inch of the model student he is, opens the door with a beam. “Iwa-chan,” he sings, closing the door behind him with a kiss to his mother’s cheek, heading off down his front garden’s pathway, “it’s our last first day.”

“Don’t I know it.”

“No need to be stingy.” The sky is clear and the wind is delicate. Iwaizumi tucks his hands into his pockets and casts a look up, feeling far away from Lake Katanuma even if it had only been a day or so ago. Next to him Oikawa nudges his arm, and when Iwaizumi looks down his brow is quirked, playful. “And I thought I was the sentimental one.”

“I’m not being sentimental,” Iwaizumi defends, ears growing pink. “Just wondering whether or not Hanamaki and Matsukawa resurfaced from the depths since Friday. They haven’t texted me.”

“Me, neither.”

A pause. “It’ll be fine. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

“I hope so. Jesus. I don’t want to be called in as a witness. I can’t have a criminal record dent my squeaky clean past.”

“A criminal record is the  _ least _ of your concerns…”

At break they’re left alone, passing a juice carton between them. It’s only mid-way through lunch time that they’re interrupted.

“What’s up, lovebirds?”

Hanamaki slides his tray down the table, Matsukawa following closely behind. There’s sunburn from ear to ear across Hanamaki’s face save for two circles where he’d been wearing his sunglasses. Iwaizumi wants to punch him.

“Where the  _ hell _ have you two been?” Oikawa demands, mouth full of milk bread and custard. “You didn’t reply to any of my messages!”

“Woah, calm it, Captain. We’ve been laying low. Hiding from the fuzz.”

“Phone got lost to the flames,” Matsukawa elaborates. He’s got an old sports bag on his shoulder and bags under his eyes. Hanamaki, on the other hand, is carrying his files under his arm. “Count yourselves lucky.”

“Well,” Oikawa amends, looking for a way to seem more correct than he obviously isn’t, “you could have emailed. I nearly put out a missing person’s report on you two.”

“Oh, as if.” Iwaizumi’s eyes roll. “I’d have been more inclined to leave you two out there to rot like that fucking Bratz tent.”

“Where were you two, anyway?” Oikawa swallows his milk bread and frowns. His finger, manicured, comes out to point an accusatory jab at them both. 

Hanamaki nods to Matsukawa. “Late. God, you really worried for us? Very cute, Captain. You might make my heart beat out of my chest.”

“Oh, gross.” Oikawa’s nose wrinkles. He leans back in the plastic chair of the canteen and pats the table. “Well, sit, anyway. You look like two weirdos lingering at the end like that.”

“Ouch. Sick burn.”

Iwaizumi leans his chin in his hand, chopsticks and lunch ignored in favour of savouring the moment. He knows that next year he won’t have this; the understanding between the four of them that’s so hard to come by with other people; with Hanamaki’s frightening antics, Matsukawa’s often illegal approach to situations, and Oikawa’s laugh. 

He knows they’re all feeling it--the sentimentality of the situation, tender like a bruise. They’re all avoiding the conversation of  _ what happens next year? _

It’s Oikawa, surprisingly, who breaks on the stiff atmosphere. “You know what?”

“What?”

“I think we should do the same thing for  _ your, _ ” he points a finger to Hanamaki, “birthday.”

“It’ll be freezing by then. January’s in winter.”

“Well, yeah! Perfect time to start a fire!”

The atmosphere dissolves as Iwaizumi barks his laughter. It only seems to trigger the other three until they’re giggling in fits of sleep-deprived hysteria and relief. 

He knows that it’ll always be at the back of their minds; that this is their last year properly together, but the thought is pushed to a far corner of his mind. Impending doom never helped anyone, after all. Under the table Oikawa bumps his knee with his, and he knows that when they walk home tonight and the day after next that he’ll still be the same Oikawa he’s known since childhood. There’s a conversation to be had there, but, for now, he lets himself melt into another fit of laughter as the sun shines above their last year at school together. 

Iwaizumi bumps his knee back against Oikawa’s and meets his smile with his own. 

**Author's Note:**

> this has been in my works for months and months and months and i was desperate to get it finished but it still feels very disjointed and scrappy. i'm trying to be less critical with my work so i've posted it anyway but if it reads like shit--not to worry. i am well aware.
> 
> iwaoi has always been one of my favourite dynamics EVER and oikawa is my favourite hq character so i love writing him (*¯︶¯*) seijoh 3rd years are also my favourites. eufegwfwiefwefbefbew long story short i am a huge aj stan and wanted to write something for them!
> 
> thank you for reading! any and all comments are much appreciated!


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